Lack of maintenance culture of development projects in rural areas has been identified as the bane of sustainability of such projects in most rural communities of Nigeria.

Speaking at a two-day sensitisation workshop for selected mass media professionals in Kwara State in Ilorin recently, the state project coordinator of Kwara State FADAMA Development Office, Mallam Usman Akanbi, said bureaucratic nature of local government administration had also slowed down efforts, just as he advised local government authorities to encourage the project in their areas.

The FADAMA coordinator, who said the development project was designed as a bottom-up approach, added that it involved rural communities in the planning, execution and monitoring towards ensuring food security and eliminating hunger.

Some of the FADAMA projects in most rural areas of Kwara State include fish farming, vegetable farming, poultry and some infrastructural projects like bridge construction.

Mallam Usman, who said about 844 FADAMA sub-projects were spread across the 16 local government areas of the state, added that the project also provided training and technical assistance.

He also said that N120 million had been disbursed so far among FADAMA community associations under FADAMA III programme, adding that about 150 communities had benefitted.

He also said that part of the challenges of the programme was in the attitude of the people who refused to pay the matching grant of 30 per cent meant to ensure a sense of belonging and complement the 70 per cent fund by the project.

Mallam Usman aslo said that some communities compromised through contracting some development projects to unqualified people at the expense of the desired result of the project.

The FADAMA coordinator, who called for re-orientation among people towards achieving sustainability, said the project had helped to improve socio-economic life of rural people and reduced poverty through community efforts, adding that the project also provided skills acquisition, capacity building and manpower training for increased agricultural yield among farmers in rural communities.